He released one long exhale, serene and endless, and everything stilled with him.

I held him closer. The warmth steadied into something rhythmic, ancient. My Scripture and Seth’s Breath pulsed in time with the faint glow beneath his skin.

Seth’s voice was low, reverent. “He was never dangerous. Only full.”

I nodded. The gold faded to a quiet shimmer that clung to both of us.

From the doorway the others watched, half lit in the hush. “We cannot leave him here,” I said.

Seth met my eyes. “And we cannot cleanse him here. The grief in these walls would only feed him again.”

The child stirred once, eyes opening, one gold, one silver, steady and unblinking, as though balance itself had chosen a face.

We carried him through the corridor toward Elizabeth’s room. Each step left a faint shimmer on the tiles, and the air warmed in our wake. He never wept, never flinched. He simply breathed, calm and endless, as though Heaven itself had decided to rest.

Elizabeth’s door loomed ahead. Voices rose beyond it, sharp and panicked.

The hospital room boiled with chaos. Family members crowded inside, shouting over one another. Hands flailed. A nurse stood cornered, eyes wide with fear.
And at the center of it all, the priest. His voice thundered, his arms lifted high, the air around him thick with judgment.

“She is unfit to decide. She is delusional.”
“She gave that child away.”
“They should be arrested. Where is security?”

When they saw me holding the baby, the chaos turned its aim.
“There. That is the woman who took him.”
“The man with her, he is in on it.”

Seth moved before I could answer. He did not raise his voice or his glow, yet the air bowed around him. Even the lights above seemed to dim in respect. Every step he took pressed against the room like a shifting tide. The noise faltered, then died beneath the weight of something older than fear.

When he spoke, his words carried no echo. Only finality.
“Who among you dares speak against her?”

The priest tried. “She stole that child. He is cursed. A demon.”

Seth turned his head, slow and deliberate. The motion alone silenced him.
“Choose your next words carefully,” he said, his tone low enough to make the walls vibrate. “Because the moment they leave your mouth, Heaven will decide what to do with your tongue.”

The crowd recoiled. Someone stumbled. Another gasped as if air itself had turned to stone.

Seth stepped closer.
“Call her a thief again,” he murmured, “and I will show you what theft really means, when light takes back what darkness borrowed.”

No one moved. No one breathed. The priest’s defiance withered into trembling silence.

Then Seth lifted his hand, not to strike, but to quiet the world.
“You will leave,” he said. “Now. Or I will make sure your words never find air again.”

That did it. Feet scrambled. The nurse slammed the alarm in blind panic. The siren wailed through the ward, scattering the crowd like startled birds.

And through it all, Seth did not flinch. He simply lowered his hand. Calm. Absolute. Divine.

When the echoes faded, all that remained was the hum of fear and the stillness he left behind. Not peace. Not even quiet. Just the lingering truth. No one wanted to know what would happen if he truly lost patience.

Only four remained. Seth, myself, Lady Elsa at the door, and Elizabeth, pale and shaking, clutching the sheets as if they might save her.

Her eyes flicked to the baby in my arms. Her lips parted, soundless.

I stepped closer, slow enough for her to retreat if she wished. She did not. Her spirit reached for him even as her body shrank back.
“His name is Israel,” I said gently. “And he is not a demon.”

Elizabeth’s voice cracked. “You did not carry him. You do not know the dreams. The voices. What he did to me.”

“I know what he is,” I answered, lowering my voice to her trembling quiet. “He carries what you were never meant to. That was not your fault. And it is not his.”

Seth moved beside me. “He is not dangerous,” he said softly. “He is divine. But he needs you to see him, not the burden he bears.”

As he spoke, a faint glow passed from Seth’s hand to Elizabeth’s chest, no brighter than candlelight. Her breath hitched. The glow spread like ripples across water, carrying a rush of memory that was not hers alone. She saw it, his first heartbeat echoing in her womb, her whispered prayers drowned by fear, the warmth of a love she never dared to claim. For a fleeting moment, she felt him, his light, his pain, his forgiveness, all at once.

The connection broke, and the glow vanished.

Her hands shook. Tears welled, not hysteria but surrender.
“I was not enough,” she whispered.

I bent and placed Israel into her arms. “You were never meant to fix him. You were meant to hold him steady until we could.”

Elizabeth clutched him close, and the shadows that had haunted her softened. His glow steadied. For a heartbeat, peace returned, fragile but real.

Then came the sound.

Low, hollow, older than language. It rolled through us like the echo of a bell struck before the first dawn.

Seth stiffened. I felt it too.

The Scripture along my arms stirred without command, golden glyphs rising across my skin like molten fire taking shape. They shimmered, alive, reforming with each breath. Beside me, Seth’s Silver Breath unfurled, threads of light spiraling outward, moving with their own divine will.

Elizabeth gasped. The sound tore through the stillness. Her hands clutched at the sheets, dragging them to her chin as though thin cloth could defend her from the impossible.
Her eyes darted from my glowing skin to Seth’s living mist. Her lips trembled. “No. You cannot be human. What are you people?”

Her disbelief cracked beneath the weight of wonder. Terror bloomed, but so did reverence. She shook her head, tears spilling freely. “Dear God. What have I done?”

Her voice broke again, small and aching. “I called him cursed. I called him a demon. I should have tried to understand.” The words collapsed into a sob. “I failed him.”

Then the wall behind us opened.

It was not thunder or stone that broke the silence, but it was as if the Sepulcher itself exhaled, relieved that the threads of destiny had finally found their weave.

Light spilled through the fracture, shaping pillars and shadowed domes. Gold shimmered along carved reliefs of wings and eyes. The frozen figures of the Angels of Reverence turned their hollow gazes toward us. For the first time, they were not blind.

The door burst open. Alec, Jamey, Gabriel, and the twins slipped in with Lady Elsa as the crack widened. Jamey pressed his palm against the wood and a silver shimmer sealed the door, muting the chaos outside.

Elizabeth’s sobs fell silent. She could not look away. Reverence clung to her like light to glass. She held Israel close, trembling as if cradling the center of creation.

And then the world shifted.

The Sepulcher’s heart rose around us, vast and radiant. The room that had once been our prison now breathed with purpose.

My Living Scripture came alive, gilded light racing across my skin and pouring toward the Sepulcher’s core. Seth’s Silver Breath followed, threading through it like living silk until the two were indistinguishable. Flame and Breath, moving as one.

They rippled across the luminous walls, writing light into air, air into faith.

Alec’s presence warmed at my back as he bent close and whispered, “Max. Is this the part of the Sepulcher you and Seth stayed in while you were gone those five years?”

I turned too abruptly and my lips brushed his cheek. “How do you know that?” I glanced at Seth and pretended not to notice the look he shot me for the mistaken kiss. Alec murmured, “Because your Flame and Seth’s Breath look at home inside these walls.”

I faced the Sepulcher again.

One by one, glyphs separated from the glow and began to rise, spinning slowly, pulsing with the rhythm of eternity. Two shone brightest. One pure gold, the other silver, orbiting each other like twin stars caught in divine gravity.

Then two more emerged, joining the dance but lingering just apart. One of them began to pulse in sync with the golden glyph, its light trembling like a heartbeat finding its match. Sparks flared from its core, bright and alive.

Without thinking, I grabbed Seth’s arm, a bit too tightly.
He winced but grinned, voice low for me alone.
“Careful, Flame. You break it, you buy it. And by buy it, I mean you will be stuck nursing me for a week, which, come to think of it, might be worth it.”

I laughed under my breath. “You would like that too much.”

“Obviously,” he said, entirely unashamed.

“Anyway,” I murmured, releasing his arm, “tell me if you can read what that glyph is, because something about it is resonating with me, and it is not just my Scripture.”

He rubbed his arm with exaggerated injury and gave me the look.
“I could have said that without you trying to snap my bones, thanks. But yes, I feel it too.”

His attention shifted back to the floating lights. “The gold one is you. The silver is me. That much is certain.”

“Right,” I said, eyes fixed on the smaller glyph now shimmering beside the gold. “Then the little one next to my golden one, that must be Alec. Look at how it sparks. Just like his temper.”

Alec shot me a look. “My temper keeps you alive, thank you very much.”

The glyph pulsed faster, as if it had heard us. A ripple of energy struck us both, sharp and clean, slamming behind our eyes. Words bloomed unbidden in our minds and together, in one breath, we spoke:

“I am the storm that guards the flame.
I strike, yet seek no crown or name.
My wrath protects, my silence warns.
I am the calm that holds the storms.”

When it ended, the trance shattered.

The team stared, half in awe, half confused. Alec’s ears flushed scarlet, a dead giveaway.

Jamey’s grin stretched ear to ear. “I want one too. Make one up about me.”

I tapped the back of his head lightly. “We did not make it up, you goof. We are just the receivers. The Sepulcher is doing the talking.”

He rubbed his head, pouting. “I still want one.”

The Sepulcher did not seem to care. Another glyph drifted forward, settling beside the silver one. As it rotated, it pulsed, but no color showed, not like Alec’s spark, nor my gold, nor Seth’s silver. Before anyone could speak, the trance took us again.

“I move no stone, yet nations turn.
I wield no blade, yet kingdoms burn.
In every doubt, my echo hides,
The whisper’s weight where choice divides.”

I blinked, pulse still racing. “Did you catch that one?”

Samantha already had a notepad in her hand. She raised a brow. “Loud and clear.” She twirled her pen toward us. “You two keep glowing and chanting. I will keep notes on your weirdness.”

I rested my head on Seth’s shoulder and exhaled. “He must be one of us. But what exactly does he do?”

Before anyone could reply, another glyph glided forward. A deeper hue, violet with faint ripples of shadow. Its motion was deliberate, heavy, like thought given form. The energy wrapped around us, solemn and quiet, then drew back as it settled beside the sparkling glyph that represented Alec.

The trance swept us again.

“I walk with spirits, bound yet free.
I guard their peace, their agony.
Between the living and the dead,
I keep the line where light has bled.”

When the vision released us, the room felt heavier, as though the air had taken on weight.

Samantha’s voice broke the silence. “That one definitely did not sound like any of us.”

“No,” I said, shaking off the haze. “That one belongs to someone we have not met yet.”

Seth nodded, eyes distant. “And whoever they are, they will walk close to death itself.”

The next glyph rose, soft silver streaked with blue, glimmering like moonlight through water. Its surface rippled, bending the light around it.

“I do not break. I bend the flow.
What strikes at you will strike below.
The world may wound, but I return,
Not pain for pain, but lesson learned.”

The trance broke again.

Jamey whistled. “Okay, whoever that is, remind me not to fight them.”

Seth’s lips twitched. “You would lose before you finished your sentence.”

“Thanks for the faith,” Jamey muttered.

I grinned. “You, faith? You would trip over your own shoes halfway through the prophecy.”

Jamey raised a hand in mock offense. “For the record, I am an excellent tripper.”

Laughter loosened the room. The glyphs seemed to hum brighter, pulsing in rhythm with the sound.

Then another glyph appeared and settled beside the one with no color. Two fine rings overlapped and circled it, and as it pulsed we could see tiny constellations residing within the rings. It hovered, pulsed once, then stilled, while the rings continued to orbit.

Seth angled his chin toward the glowing core. “Look closer, Flame. In the rings. Do you see the constellations forming?”

I squinted, and the breath caught in my throat.

Within the spiraling light, fine threads curved and crossed, tracing faint star lines that shimmered like living starlight.
“The Ram,” I whispered, my hand rising. “That is Aries. And there, Taurus, charging through the light beside it.”

Alec and Jamey stepped closer at the same time. “I see it too,” they said together.

Samuel had been quiet, watchful. “If I may, you and Seth can see all of this, correct, boss?” I nodded. He touched a finger to his chin. “I have noticed that Alec and Jamey see the same things the rest of us cannot. Correct?” I nodded again.

Before anyone could add to it, the trance took Seth and me once more.

“I read the sky, yet walk the ground.
In turning spheres, my truth is found.
What moves above, I draw below.
The stars record what hearts do not show.”

Seth looked toward me, expression thoughtful. “How many do you think there will be? I cannot keep doing this all day.”

Just like that, twenty one smaller glyphs appeared, but they looked strange. They had no glow, and they settled in three neat rows of seven beneath the rotating lights.

“That makes it twenty eight, Seth,” Samuel said softly.

“Twenty eight,” I answered without hesitation. “But not all at once. Heaven never reveals its hand that easily.”

Seth smiled faintly. “Then I hope the next ones are ready for what they are walking into.”

“Or for who they will be walking with,” I said, meeting his gaze.

We stood in the radiance, staring at five vibrant glyphs turning beside the greater gold and silver. We had more questions than answers. The Sepulcher’s glow began to dim, folding back into stillness, leaving the air warm and watchful, as if it had passed along everything it was allowed to say.

I looked at the four newest lights and felt no comfort, only certainty. Four powerful lives were already on a path that would cross ours, and when they did, the shape of this war would change.

The baby’s breath steadied against Elizabeth’s heart. Seth’s Silver Breath softened. My Scripture fell quiet.
The world may have gone still once before, but this time, it was bracing for us.